The Angel, the Witch, and the Alchohol
by Don't Eat Dead Doves
Summary: Yuuko meets Ryo in passing. Apparently, misery breeds company and Yuuko needs a new drinking buddy. (less about alcohol, more about hitsuzen)


**Hi all,**

**I know many of you don't like Ryo, but I genuinely feel sorry for him. He got the short end of the stick, made undeniably shitty decisions, but I still pity him.**

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**This fic takes place during canon for Devilman Crybaby and pre-canon for XXXholic. It is a series of interactions between Ryo and Yuuko, as she prepares to meet Watunuki and he sets out to end the world.**

**Apparently, misery breeds company, and makes a good drinking buddy. I hope you enjoy!**

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**Don't forget to review! **

**~Dove**

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It is a strange occasion for one to enter the shop more than once.

She took note of him the first time, short blonde hair, and long slender fingers, a gaze so unusual for a child. His shirt was white, as if untainted.

She almost laughs at the irony, for there was blood at the edges of his sleeves. The boy killed a stray cat that day. It was a pitible thing, hit by a car while chasing a bird. It had nestled in the alley a few streets away. These were the few times in his life that the boy felt sorry for something.

He gave mercy in the alley. The cat didn't try to run, didn't try to fight. It was a smart creature, wise, ostracised as a symbol of bad luck.

And death follows those born under an unlucky star.

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The boy did nothing but browse, glance at her once, twice before returning to his search. Yuuko thought about explaining the shop to him, but she knew that he would not listen. Instead, she was content to watch him rummage through the shelves, with the detached air of a dead man.

A walking corpse.

Yuuko knew it would not end well for him, but couldn't help but be surprised when he left without buying anything. He was still a child, although she is certain he is older, something other than the human he was pretending to be.

Yuuko has seen many things, but her sight only extends so far.

She knows the song of the world, and she is content to hum it, let the chords strike as they wish.

He will come back, when he is much older.

She's sure to have some booze ready.

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"Welcome~!"

He's older now, a college professor. Yuuko saw him on the screen downtown the other day while she was at her favorite drug store. The liquor there is cheap, tastes good when she can't bring herself to drink anything else.

The boy, _man,_ walks almost tediously, as if the world is only a balance, and if he trips he will tear it. He finds delight in the patterns on the walls, dates the ages of the furniture without much thought.

He sees the sword hanging behind her and decides that a vassal must have used it long ago to protect their lord from an assassin, while traveling through the mountains. The hired assassins were slain, but the vassal died, shielding his lord from a poisoned arrow. The sword was honored, preserved, comes to hang behind her.

He isn't sure if the marks are bloodstains, or simply dust from her own lack of care.

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"How long has this been in your possession?"

Yuuko smirks, "Most of this was simply payment, or…. Perhaps it is merely coincidence."

The young man scoffs. "There is no such thing as coincidence, only logic."

"Oh?"

"The world is a pattern. We are destined to die from the moment we are born, there is merely a tipping point in our genetic code, we grow old, we grow up, we have children, we continue the human race. That is futile, everyone leaves, we destroy the earth."

"Hm, I also believe that there is no coincidence, only hitsuzen."

"Hitsuzen?"

She takes delight in knowing that this is the only time in his life he may have been at a loss for words.

"It is written." she says, gleefully.

He nods. "I agree."

"I don't. We are talking about very different things. Maru! Moro! Bring out the sake!"

The sake is brought in. He sips it expressionlessly, finds it bitter. She laughs and calls for another bottle.

"Hitsuzen is not logic." she says. "It is _fated, written_."

"I don't follow you."

She laughs gloatingly, and the young man takes another long drink, the alcohol burns his throat. It feels like sin, but it leaves him warm.

A timer rings, and he pulls out his phone. He has a television interview scheduled to discuss his classes, his Phd, his genius. He leaves, once again taking in the paper painted screens, the tatami floors, the decidedly drunk _(but still remarkably coherent) _woman sitting on the floor.

Her robe is white like his, decorated with an endless sea of butterflies as opposed to barren.

Where he is like a blank, crisp page that one could cut their finger on, she is the cloudy sky that urges the butterflies to take flight in the cold air.

"I'm Yuuko," she says, "keeper of this shop."

"Asuka Ryo." He makes his way to the gate.

"See you later Ryo-chan~!" She croons.

"Perhaps we should drink again some time."

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"Where are their souls?" He asks. He is a stranger, less real. Ryo glances at Maru and Moro with an air of caution. She smiles in the way she always does. Her smirk alone is a concealed answer, and she is certain now he understands.

They go through the same ritual they always do, he searches without knowing what he's looking for, what this shop could really give him. Yuuko knows that he can tell that she is so strange, and so old, and so human, but he never comments on it. She never says anything either.

So in the end, just consider it common courtesy.

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She offers him booze, she's bored, she wants to get drunk.

Yuuko supposes, as her nights are often plagued with visions of a boy with glasses and a bad haircut, that this is their way of forgetting.

Ryo is running from something, he will never tell her, and she will never know. And perhaps _(as she is a dying woman) _Yuuko is living her long life with enough alcohol to end the monotony.

At least they aren't drinking alone.

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Maru and Moro place the masu on the table, letting the rice waft to the surface as the wine spills over the edges. Ryo sharpens his knife along the table legs. "I had a shit father. He was terrible at his job, left me alone, gave me no guidance. But, that in itself was enough. He taught me how to survive."

"Where is he now?"

He pauses. Slowly a hand reaches up, and a finger points above.

"Angels and Demons," he murmurs, before pausing and pointing downwards. "That is the most conventional way to put it. I'm not sure if he's dead. I'm not sure if he was ever there at all."

Yuuko doesn't answer.

He leaves again, phone pressed to his ear, shouting urgently.

She won't stop him, it is his fate after all.

_Logic. _

_Hitsuzen. _

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_The world is new. Satan returns to the graveyard. _

_It has been long since they have been there. They buried the first cat Ryo ever killed here, deep in the dirt. The next day lilies grew in its place, spidery and ethereal, although they couldn't be bothered by the flowers' beauty._

_There is a charming sort in the graveyard, there, our loved ones return to the earth, but Satan _(or Ryo, for the two were one and the same) _has never loved anyone. Never bothered with such a human desire. They fell to earth, the world was a wicked place, and they made it so._

_Perhaps you could call it coincidence, but in the end it was only hitsuzen._

_Akira had never wanted to be buried, attributed to his fear of dark spaces. He had wanted to be cremated, scattered into the wind and the sea, to help the coral grow._

_No one they knew was buried here, just strangers, a long dead auntie._

_The spider lilies are calling him now, (and he must go before the call becomes too great) for spiders spin their delicate webs and trap butterflies, still beating their gossamer wings as the world meets ash._

_Ryo turns, leaves the graveyard for the lands beyond._

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_The butterfly, by some design, escapes the web._

_(Perhaps it was never trapped to begin with)_

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He's back again, only this time he is more human than he has ever been.

He's scarless, but his eyes are like the roiling sea, the rising of the tempest as the waves drown ships, as that is their right. They were always so much more dangerous than any ship, for although man has managed to tame the dangerous waters, the waves still drown.

The sailors still live for the sea.

Yuuko is no sailor, she is no boat, nor no wave. She is like the guiding star, or the siren, urging the sailors to crash upon the rocks. Or perhaps she is merely the gust of wind, bringing the sailors the kisses of lovers, the cooling breeze when the sun is hot, the force they rely upon to push them forward, until they can paddle on their own.

Yuuko smiles, "How long has it been?"

He doesn't answer.

"Drink with me?" She asks, petulant, like a child. "C'mon Ryo-chan! Let's get drunk!"

He sighs, takes a sip straight from her china tokuri, before downing the entire thing like a shot. She claps, dubiously impressed.

"Yuuko," he says. "What is this shop?" _Why are you alive? You knew me. _

_You _knew.

People who know him shouldn't be alive. Because back then, from the fiery ashes of a sinful world came rebirth. Heaven is empty, the devils are asleep, dreaming horrid dreams.

The world doesn't remember a man named Ryo Asuka, the disastrous events of a world that went up in flames. The devils are dead, slain by desire, his desire, _Satan's_. The world was reborn, the dead live, but those who were of the demons are gone now, erased from existence by a clap of flame.

Yuuko could hear the screaming of their counterparts in every other dimension.

Life returns to normal.

The code is rewritten.

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Ryo, for he is a pitiful thing, does not envy the one's who don't remember, for now there is no true joy, no sorrow, no love except his own for the only friend he ever knew.

"What is this shop?" he asks again, setting down the bottle.

She grins. "This is a shop that sells wishes."

He nods.

"You don't seem surprised." She states languidly.

Ryo shrugs, "I would like to buy one."

"One of what?" She asks coyly.

"A wish." he says, not caring.

There is silence, Maru and Moro stand near the door, grinning eerily as usual. The clock ticks, and the wind chimes sound delicate and sad.

Ryo flips the choko. Leaning forward, he places his delicate lips to her ear. His wish is soft, apologetic, almost tentative in a way never associated with Asuka Ryo.

"I wish to see Akira."

"There is a price," she says.

"How much?"

She laughs, her eyes examining him, piercing his soul. "You are a professor, you remember the law of equivalent exchange. This is not the first time one has wished to see the dead."

If she had expected him to stiffen, he didn't oblige, only nodded. "What are the terms?"

"The most precious thing to you is your memory of him, and to him I must believe the same. He won't see you, recognize you, know that your life was given for his."

Ryo nods. "I still wish to apologize, in the end we only did what we thought best."

She smiles, forever a stranger. "Very well."

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The seal is placed easily on the length of exposed skin, blood dripping from the open wounds. For a moment, as her magic worked its way through him she saw a shadow, _no, not a shadow, the light_, of a pair of wings.

"The wish will be fulfilled." she says with a smirk, her eyes unreadable.

Ryo nods, "Goodbye Yuuko."

This is the first time he has ever said goodbye, in all the times they've crossed paths.

Perhaps, it will be the last.

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He drifts away, his feet silent on the tatami flooring, his fingers slipping slightly as he slides open the paper panelling. The room is stranger, hazier from the smoke that comes from Yuuko's pipe, bringing the strange scent of burnt flowers and blood.

Her smirk is so incredibly sinister, and so very sad.

"Perhaps your father should have been kinder to you." The _(not)_shadows of wings flutter slightly.

"Goodbye Ryo, _Satan._"

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Ryo makes his way from the garden to the gate, passing a boy with messy hair and glasses as he is dragged almost inexplicably over the threshold. The boy doesn't glance at Ryo, nor does he glance at the boy.

He has places to be, to go, someone to see.

He looks up, a single Greta Oto floats in the breeze. It's see through, gorgeous yet easily forgettable, glassy and infinite like Ryo's eyes. He isn't completely resonant of the subtle beauty the butterfly holds, but is bewitched just the same. _(Fitting, for it is a witch that led him to it)_

The feeling in his chest leaves him drunk, It feels like alcohol, like fermented rice and American beers, and the subtle sip of wine to end a meal.

The butterfly flies on, and by some inexplicable means, he follows it.

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_A witch watches him leave, this angel who has loved so little yet lost so much, denounced their father and came to sin. Maru and Moro open the doors, and she realizes that she had been dying all along, booze clouding her senses. _

_That doesn't mean she'll quit drinking, however, for she takes pleasure in the simple things in life. _

_The contract it completed, the glass butterfly beats its wings, before a dying shudder cuts through its body. Slowly she pins it, labels it. The butterfly sits behind her on the wall, beneath the sword of a vassal who died for his lord._

_A boy, although he won't be a boy for long (in her line of work, children grow up much too quickly), stumbles into the room. _

"_Why am I-"_

"_Hitsuzen." she says, expressionless._

_And the spider spins the web again, although no one is too sure how long this Pieris Brassicae will stay trapped._

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The world doesn't remember the devils, and the blood, and the heavenly being disgraced.

The world doesn't remember, but Ryo does.

And she bore witness.

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"_Welcome~!"_

"_Are you desperate, looking for cash, a cosmic being with the weight of hitsuzen upon your shoulders? Apply for a job at the wish shop. And even if you don't get the job, Ichihara Yuuko makes a good drinking buddy!"_

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_The young man in the white coat, white as the crisp edge of a paper to cut yourself upon, smirks._

_Heaven shudders._

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**I hope you enjoyed! **

**Don't be afraid to point out any grammatical errors, spelling errors, etc, that I have made.**

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**My friend works at the butterfly pavilion at the Natural History Museum.**

**I won't pretend to be an expert, but Pieris Brassicae is a type of butterfly, known for their pale white color. They are usually seen as symbols of wisdom and growth. I thought this was fitting for Watanuki, because at the end of XXholic he really has matured. The Greta Oto is more commonly known as the glasswing butterfly, their wings are clear, signifying that Ryo hasn't quite learned his lesson yet.**

**And, if there was ever a butterfly for Yuuko, I would think it was either a blue or black one, blue butterflies are believed to grant wishes and make dreams come true, while black butterflies are assumed to signify the presence of a deity. However, a black butterfly is amoral, and their power (while great) is often used without a specific intent. I was thinking a Black Swallowtail.**

**A lot of anime (including Bleach) use butterflies as a symbol for the soul, they will probably show up a lot more in my writing.**

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**Thanks for reading!**


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